FOOTPRINTS, Claim Research & Mapping Program at your Fingertips!


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  • 4 weeks later...
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Happy New Year everyone! Ruby and I wish you all full pokes in the coming year. Thanks to Rob, Bunk, Bill and all of the wonderful prospectors who have made FootPrints such a success in our first 10 months.

We've finally finished the long awaited Gold Basin FootPrint. DVDs have been delivered to our retailers and are now available.

The Gold Basin FootPrint is our most ambitious project to date. At nearly 200 square miles (119,680 acres) and encompassing both Gold Basin and Lost Basin gold districts there is plenty of room for a lifetime of prospecting these rich gold fields. Although this is a huge map set we did not skimp on details. We are particularly proud of the fine level of detail presented in the three layers of geology. You may have heard that gold is found more frequently at particular elevations in Gold Basin. Our historical placers layer will not only show you what those elevations are but the detailed mineralogy will show you why - and what has been missed!

The Gold Basin placers were not discovered until the 1930's, they have not been extensively worked even today. With several club claims in both Gold and Lost Basins, including GPAA, GSSN and Mohave Prospectors, as well as land open to prospecting, Gold Basin FootPrint provides a wonderful opportunity for the small scale prospector to get the Gold!

The Gold Basin FootPrint is just south of Lake Mead on the Colorado River in North Western Arizona and is a popular destination for prospectors in the Las Vegas area.  You can find out more about the Gold Basin FootPrint by clicking HERE. You can order Gold Basin, and our other FootPrints, online from one of our fine retailers. A list of available retailers can be found by clicking HERE.

Upcoming MinerDiggins Adventures

You can meet Ruby and I and try FootPrints at these events

We will keep you updated as we add more events.

December 28, 2010 thru January 1, 2011

GPAA outing in Stanton, Arizona

Just got back from Stanton. It was great to meet (and prospect) with Traveler and Pat, Highbanker58, Steve, papa dave, Hawkman, RANGERMG and Mike, NoDigEm Ed, Mel, Bob and all the other great folks who braved the sun, dirt and snow over the last 11 days. Sorry to have missed Patrick in Havasu, Notorious Kelly and Gilaoro but you can't be blamed for ducking out on trying to pan in ice water (Yes it snowed Patrick! The panning bucket froze solid. :lol: )

Special Thanks go to Traveler and Pat for hosting Christmas dinner at Decision Corner for a group of hungry muddy miners! I can't think of a better Christmas gift - hope you enjoyed the color. ;)

January 15 - 16 2011 

GPAA gold show in Mesa, Arizona

Mesa Convention Center

263 North Center Street Mesa, Arizona

January 17 - 21 2011

GPAA chapter 6th annual Rendezvous

Congress, Arizona

Daily demonstrations for GPAA Chapter officers from around the US

Congress Community Center

February 7, 2011

Superstition Mountain Treasure Hunters Club

Boy's and Girls Club of Apache Junction

1755 N. Idaho Apache Junction, Arizona

Meeting starts at 7:30 pm

April 16 - 17 2011

GPAA Gold show in Las Vegas, Nevada

South Point Hotel and Casino

9777 Las Vegas Boulevard South  Las Vegas, Nevada

Wishing you BIG Nuggets and HEAVY Pans

Clay

MinerDiggins

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hello Everyone,

I Thought I would personally invite you all out to meet Clay and I at the Mesa Gold Show. We will be demonstrating FootPrints on Saturday and Sunday. Drop on by, say hello and try FootPrints first hand. We now have six FootPrints available that cover over 450 square miles of gold territory;

Gold Basin

Rich Hill

Greaterville

Little San Domingo

Vulture West

Black Canyon City

If you are a current FootPrints user, we'll be there to answer any questions you may have and provide whatever support you may need. We'd love to meet some of you!

See you in Mesa.

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Thanks applevalleyjoe! We think they are pretty great too.

We don't have any plans in the near future for Southern California. We are working on the Bradshaw Mountains and Rye Patch Nevada right now. We do map the most requested areas so your choice does count. What areas would you like to see mapped?

You can subscribe to our NewDiggins newsletter to keep track of our new maps and future plans or you can add your VOTE for an area to be mapped.

clay

MinerDiggins

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  • 1 month later...

FOOTPRINTS appears to be a quality program, just to be able to track yourself and the other features makes it hot damn material...

there is another webbased tool for researching areas and with it and then the your state plot/mapping/mining dept you can get

some pretty good info and who what when stuff on a givin area. It is a bit of a booger to figure out but the info you can gather

using all the resources is about as solid as it gets. Link to the BLM site is just below... hope someone who cant afford the footprints

pkg for what ever reason can make use of it.

http://www.geocommunicator.gov/blmMap/Map.jsp?MAP=MC

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Can you run this program on a Mac?

Hey AzOverland,

You can if you have Mac OSX and Parallels. Just load it on the PC side and map away.

We develop FootPrints on Macs and port them to Windows. You can't directly install FootPrints on OSX but you can network into the maps from Macs when you have a FootPrint installed on a local PC. We do it every day. The license allows you to network your intranet with FootPrints and it can be accessed from any computer system that can run a browser.

If you need more information you can contact me directly through our support form.

Clay

MinerDiggins

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  • 1 month later...

LAS VEGAS GOLD SHOW

Bunks Arizona Prospecting has graciously offered to host MinerDiggins this weekend at the GPAA Gold Show in Las Vegas, Sat.16th and Sun 17th. We will be demonstrating FootPrints all weekend.

Get a personal, hands-on look at any of our current FootPrints;

Black Canyon City

Rich Hill

Greaterville

Gold Basin

Vulture West

Little San Domingo

If you are a current FootPrints user, why don't you drop by and pick our brains and learn some new tips and tricks to get the most out of your FootPrint.

If you just want to see what it's all about, come on by for a hands-on demo.

If you are ready to buy and Vegas isn't in your weekend plans, you can always call Rob, he keeps all FootPrints in stock.

NEW FOOTPRINT - Northern Bradshaws coming SOON !

We are in the final stages of mapping our next FootPrint release which will cover the Northern Bradshaw Mountains near Prescott Arizona. This FootPrint will cover the favorite summertime prospecting areas of Lynx Creek, Big Bug, Walker, Groom Creek and the Upper Hassayampa.

It is over 200 square miles (133,000 acres) and covers some of the most productive gold mining areas in the country.

Keep watch here for a final release date.

GEOLOGY UPDATE for Little San Domingo FootPrint

This week we released a major update to the Little San Domingo FootPrint. Registered users should already have received a link via Email for the update. Only registered users will receive updates. Register through the Contact page in your FootPrint.

This update includes;

A Claims update current to 4/8/2011

Major Geology Update:

We have digitized USGS OFR87-9 to provide Geology at a scale of 1:24,000. You will be amazed to see some of your old prospecting areas in a new light. This new geology deserves a post of its own, more about that later.

STANTON OUTING

If you miss us at the Vegas Gold Show, drop by Stanton, AZ the weekend of April 23rd. We will be there for the GPAA Outing, demonstrating FootPrints and having a good time up on the hill. Again, we will be hosted by Bunks Arizona Prospecting. Just look for the great pumpkin. Thats where we will be.

We always enjoy meeting prospectors and showing off our maps. Drop on by for a chat.

Happy Hunting

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I'm liking the FootPrints program but some of the GPAA claims in the area are not where the Gpaa Mining Guide and Uncle Ron's show them. Anyone really know where "Friendship" and "Maybe. Maybe not" are? Footprints puts them on the east end of Ophir and Ron's and GPAA show them just west of "Golden Tattoo" over by the radio towers. Does anyone really know for sure???

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I liking the FootPrints program but some of the GPAA claims in the area are not where the Gpaa Mining Guide and Uncle Ron's show them. Anyone really know where "Friendship" and "Maybe. Maybe not" are? Footprints puts them on the east end of Ophir and Ron's and GPAA show them just west of "Golden Tattoo" over by the radio towers. Does anyone really know for sure???

Hi AzOverland,

Sorry to reply so late - we just got in from the GPAA Gold Show in Las Vegas. A good time was had by all. Met some great folks.

The FootPrint Map is correct. The GPAA and Uncle Ron are a whole Township off on their mapping. Section 28 of 19S 15E as shown on the GPAA and Uncle Ron's map is more than six miles away from the actual claim location. If you read the claim location notice as filed at the county recorder and included in your FootPrint you will see that both claims are made in Section 28 of 19S 16E - just as they are mapped on your FootPrint. The Friendship claim location notice also specifically states that it is located on Ophir Gulch

The GPAA claims book written description agrees that they are in Section 28 of 19S 16E. They also agree that the claims are accessed by Forest Road 163. It is only the GPAA claims map that is wrong.

We do not use the club claims maps to plot our claims. The only map we rely on is the actual claim location notice as filed at the county. We include each location notice in your FootPrint to save you the time involved in researching the claims location and status.

Hope that helps.

clay

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Well that's great to know. I was out in the area again this weekend and the FootPrints claim mapping seemed to be spot on. I found many corner markers and understood the area far better with the aid of Footprints. Just knowing about two more GPAA claims that maybe getting lighter use because of poor mapping in the Mining Guide is well worth the cost of the program in my opinion. "Maybe" I should have kept that to myself, or "maybe not"..... :rolleyes: Good show guys.

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.."Maybe" I should have kept that to myself, or "maybe not"..... :rolleyes: Good show guys.

Three valuable lessons learned:

First, you can't beat Footprints software

Second, can't ask a stupid question

Third, some facts are better pursued in a PM

Smiling - Terry

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Well that's great to know. I was out in the area again this weekend and the FootPrints claim mapping seemed to be spot on. I found many corner markers and understood the area far better with the aid of Footprints. Just knowing about two more GPAA claims that maybe getting lighter use because of poor mapping in the Mining Guide is well worth the cost of the program in my opinion. "Maybe" I should have kept that to myself, or "maybe not"..... :rolleyes: Good show guys.

There are lots of "secrets" in each FootPrint. No map can be up to date on all the claims all the time but FootPrints is the ONLY program that maps the actual boundaries for all the claims in an area.

We began our FootPrints adventure in 2007 because we could find no source for maps of claim data. Every prospector we talked to always said "it's all claimed up". We still hear this about every area we map. One of the "secrets" of FootPrints is that we consistently prove that it's not "all claimed up". We know of 11 claims made on Rich Hill after our Stanton/Rich Hill map was finished. Several of those claims are consistently producing gold. There are still thousands of acres of unclaimed land, open to prospecting, on that map.

Being prospectors ourselves we figured any gold map worth it's salt would have some geology and land ownership and actual roads and streams instead of funky government ideas about where they might be. Of course putting on real historical mines in their actual location instead of miles off with duplicates everywhere, like other programs, made sense too. Water seemed important so we did computer flood modeling and wetness plots and of course plotting the watersheds made sense. Having a topo was kinda a given so why not include aerial images and elevation maps. The funky 40 foot contours on topo maps don't tell you much so we made contours down to 5 foot. Of course we figured why not display our GPS Tracks and Waypoints on the map? Then there had to be a database to explain what all this complex mapping was telling us. When we finished all that stuff we realized there had to be a way to print high-quality maps of the results to take into the gold fields so we included that too. It took three years to produce the first FootPrint. If you think we have an obsession for detail consider it to be to your advantage. :)

Of course those of you who have FootPrints already know there is lots more than that to a FootPrint. Even though we make the maps we still discover "secrets" on our maps. The latest geology update for the Little San Domingo FootPrint has some real surprises and even though we just released it we heard yesterday that it is already finding gold in new places! Here's a "secret" for those who are hunting the Greaterville gold placers: Check out the small "Tlp" outcrops on the west side of Granite Mountain. This is the same quartz latite that has been shedding the gold into the placers to the east of the mountain. Notice the complex mineralization as you approach Enzenberg Canyon. If I say any more it wouldn't be a "secret" would it?

To this day there is no other source of claims being mapped to their actual boundaries. We think we have made maps that will give serious prospectors the edge in finding new placers to work. If you haven't seen FootPrints in action yet why not stop by Stanton this weekend and give it a try? We will be demonstrating FootPrints there for the last time this spring. Who knows, you might discover a few new "secrets" yourself.

Clay

MinerDiggins

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  • 3 months later...
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Hello All,

The new Northern Bradshaw Footprint is now available and being shipped. If you're interested, please contact me and we will get a copy shipped off to you. The price for the new DVD is $70 + shipping & handling.

Below is more information on the new Northen Bradshaw Footprint DVD -

The BEST Summertime prospecting goldfields in Arizona are in the Bradshaw Mountains near Prescott.

Lynx Creek, Big Bug, Walker, Groom Creek, Poland Junction and the Upper Hassayampa mining districts are all mapped in detail on this FootPrint.

We cover over 200 square miles of some of the most productive gold territory in the country. Detailing over 600 Mineral Patents granted between 1874 and 1962 proves the mineral wealth of these mountains. Many of these patents are now open to prospecting and claiming as part of the Prescott National Forest.

Lynx Creek is the most productive placer creek in the history of Arizona mining. This FootPrint maps the entire creek drainage, including the Lynx Creek Withdrawal Area, the popular public prospecting site that still produces good gold and is workable all year long.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Patents & History

In the area covered by this FootPrint we detail over 700 Patents. Including Homesteads, Mineral Placer, and Mineral Lode Claims.

There is a wealth of easily accessible historical data about mining in the Bradshaw Mountains. Knowing the locations and names of mineral patents allows you marry the history of the area with the map Doing this can provide valuable insights as to where the gold may lie.

We provide a custom map layer, showing the boundaries of all Land Patents in the area along with a database that tells you if the mineral rights were transferred with the patent. An actual copy of the patent is provided where available.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Geology

The Bradshaw Mountains have a complex geology. This FootPrint maps the Geology of the entire area at a scale 1:100k, clearly identifying numerous mineralized belts where gold is likely to be found.

Combining the Geology layer with the Hydrography layers will help you identify those downstream areas most likely to contain placer gold.

The complete USGS Geologic Report is included with the FootPrint for extended research.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mining Claims

As with all of our FootPrints, we map all claims to their Actual Boundaries as filed with the County Recorder. The land covered by the North Bradshaw FootPrint is mostly within the boundaries of the Prescott National Forest and open to mineral entry.

There are still thousands of acres of good prospecting areas available for claiming identified on this FootPrint.

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The new Northern Bradshaw Footprint is now available and being shipped.

This FootPrint was a long time coming for Clay and I. Partly because its been an adventurous summer out here in the Gila, partly because the North Bradshaw FootPrint has an incredible amount of detail. We are glad to finally have it shipping. We are already getting great feedback from prospectors in the area who are finding new prospecting places in their own backyards.

There are hundreds of historic mines, patents and placer workings in this area. It covers some of the most productive and important gold districts in the State. Take a look at the full extent of the map below. I am sure that you all recognize some of these areas near Prescott.

Whenever we map a new area, I collect history, maps, geology and all kinds of other stuff to help prospectors with their research. I have posted a page of links on our website.

Mining History - North Bradshaws

I have lots more to post up over the next week or so. The first link is to my current blog which reproduces parts of a USGS geologic report that details the history of placer operations on Lynx Creek. After all this time, and dredging, I know folks getting good gold out of that creek this year!

In our Ripple Library, there are some additional maps of the area, Including our custom 3D topo of the Lynx Creek area. The 1905 Geologic Folio of the Bradshaw Mountains and the USGS 1903 Topo map of the Bradshaw Mountain Quadrangle.

MinerDigginsMap

Geologic Folio

USGS 1903 Topo

Keep an eye out for new research postings on my Ripple Blog. There is a huge amount of historical information available about the Bradshaws. Many thanks to Sharlot Hall in Prescott for its massive efforts to preserve local history. Be sure to look them up when doing your research.

NBExtlg.jpg

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well it's that time of year again.

If you haven't filed your claims maintenance fee yet this year you are running out of time. Don't be late or your claims will be deemed "abandoned" by the BLM! :spank:

Technically the assessment year runs from noon on September 1st of each year to noon on September 1st the following year. Just to be safe it would be wise to make sure you are paid up by August 31st.

I get a lot of questions about filing requirements this time of year. Rather than trying to answer every one personally I will try to answer all your questions in this one post. If I miss anything or something is unclear please don't hesitate to put in your 2 cents.

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ANNUAL CLAIM MAINTENANCE FEE PAYMENT

The assessment fee (claim maintenance payment fee in BLM speak) for this year (2011) is now $140.00 per claim. :(

You may put all your claims on one maintenance payment declaration and you may pay all the fees due in one check, money order, cash or Visa/Mastercard. Make your check payable to DOI - Bureau of Land Management

Always include your MC registration number (AMC###### in Arizona) and the claim name and location on your declaration. Don't forget to sign the check and the declaration! If your payment is less than required the payment you have sent will be applied to the lowest MC numbers first, once the money runs out your remaining claims will be declared abandoned.

You may mail your payment and declaration to the BLM. As long as it is postmarked before September 1st and received in their office before September 15th you are good to go.

If you are paying an Annual Maintenance Fee you are required by law to file an INTENTION TO HOLD at the County Recorders Office on your existing claims each year. The BLM can not declare your claims as "abandoned" for failure to make this public filing but it is a good idea to do so.

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SMALL MINERS WAIVER

Many of you are confused by the Small Miners Waiver. This waiver is available to those of you who have 10 or fewer mining claims Nationally. In addition ALL the other locators listed on your claims must have 10 or fewer claims Nationally.

You must have done your assessment work on EACH claim or group of claims. The Small Miners Waiver relieves you of the maintenance payment for the year in which it is filed. There is no fee to file a Small Miners Waiver.

If you are eligible under the above rule you must file your Small Miners Waiver ANNUALLY before September 1st of each year.

The first years assessment is always paid in full at the time of filing your claim with the BLM. There is NO Small Miners Waiver available in the first year.

If you have not declared your Small Miners Waiver in the previous year you must explain why no assessment work was done in that year. For those of you who are making your first Waiver on a new claim the reason is simply "My claim was located in that assessment year". If you have been paying your yearly maintenance fee and are for the first time taking advantage of the Small Miners Waiver the reason would be "I paid a maintenance fee to maintain my claim(s) during that assessment year".

The legal year for assessment WORK ASSESSMENT is different than the MAINTENANCE FEE year. This has led to a lot of confusion.

If you are filing a Small Miners Waiver the WORK ASSESSMENT year runs from December 30 (NOT December 31st!). You should file your Small Miners Waiver before September 1st of 2011 and then file your Affidavit of Work before December 30th 2011 (If you can you should file before September 1st so as not to confuse your BLM "officials").

If you are paying the ANNUAL MAINTENANCE FEE the year runs from September 1st.

The Small Miners Waiver OR the Annual Maintenance Fee must be filed by September 1st.

IF you are filing a Small Miners Waiver your Annual Affidavit of Assessment Work must be filed with the BLM by December 30th (Each claim is a $10 filing fee). That Affidavit of work done MUST be notarized and filed with the County Recorder (in the County the claim is located in) BEFORE you file a copy with the BLM.

------------------------------------

To recap:

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Claims Maintenance Fees are $140 PER CLAIM and are due by September 1st.

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The Small Miners Waiver must be filed by September 1st.

The copy of your County Recorders filing of your Affidavit of Assessment Work must be filed with the BLM by December 30th.

Both of these filings are required to make your Small Miners Waiver valid.

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Here are more specifics on the Small Miners Waiver from the BLM:

You must submit BLM's waiver certification form on or before September 1 of each assessment year for which you are seeking a waiver. You must submit your waiver on or before September 1 for BLM to exempt your claims or sites from the annual maintenance fee requirement that is due on the same date. You may have an agent submit a waiver form on your behalf if you file or have filed with BLM a power of attorney or other legal documentation which shows that the agent is acting on your behalf.

All waiver requests must include:

(1) The names and addresses of all claimants who maintain an interest in the mining claims or sites listed on the waiver document;

(2) The original signatures of the claimants of the mining claims or sites who are requesting the waiver, or the original signature of the authorized agent of the owner or owners of those mining claims or sites;

(3) The names of the mining claims or sites for which you request a waiver;

(4) The serial numbers, if available, that BLM assigned to the mining claims or sites; and

(5) The date the maintenance fee was due from which you are seeking a waiver.

Small miner waiver requests must include a declaration that:

(1) You and all related parties hold no more than a total of 10 mining claims and sites nationwide;

(2) You have completed or will complete all assessment work required by the General Mining Law to maintain your claims by the end of the applicable assessment year.

(3) If you were not required to perform assessment work in the previous assessment year, you must include the reason why assessment work was not required in your certification.

I've included links to some forms that may be used to make your filings. You may make your filings in your own words as long as the required elements are included in your declarations.

The mailing address for Arizona BLM is:

Bureau of Land Management

Arizona State Office

One North Central Avenue

Suite 800

Phoenix, AZ 85004-4427

In other States you must send your BLM filings to the State Office.

You can find your County Recorder HERE.

All the filing forms except the Small Miners Waiver are HERE.

The Small Miners Waiver can be found HERE.

Clay

MinerDiggins

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  • 3 months later...

Any plans of getting Footprints on the I-Phone or I-Pad? Would love to take these into the feild.

Sorry AzOverland but we haven't even ported the program to OSX yet much less IOS. :blush:

Besides a lack of demand for the small device mapping such as Android and IOS (you are the second person to ask) we are really aiming towards more information over a bigger area at higher resolutions. Small screens and small hard drives don't really fit into that plan.

I doubt your phone would handle maps measuring in the gigabytes and screen resolutions of ~ 31,000 X 17,000 pixels. That is the type of resolutions we are producing our maps at now.

We spent several years getting all that data to appear effortlessly in under 4 seconds. We have had to be very innovative to squeeze more than 12 gigabytes onto a 4 gigabyte installation disk. Doing the same for a smaller, slower device would prove very difficult if not impossible at the present time.

When the small device market produces faster, higher resolution machines and prospectors adopt that technology for their field use we will be right there offering a FootPrints version for those platforms. In the meantime have you looked into the various Samsung and Sony hardened field use laptops? Small screens (10") that are daylight readable, waterproof and shock proof, with fast processors and ample memory and storage. These machines are available today at a reasonable price and frankly they will smoke your iPhone or iPad. Where there is a will there is a way.

:D

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  • 1 year later...

Big thanks to Clay diggins and Ruby Miner....

Thank you for putting out a no bs map, thanks to you guys I am the proud owner of a few new claims...in an area thought to be all had!!

Any one needing any detailed mapping, Legal claimwork, or sensitive areas researched the guys down at Miner Diggins are the best there is

Thank you two again outstanding maps!!!!!

Justin.

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Hey y'all..... Prickly Paul here!!!

Thanks for the DVD's and you will probably want me to send you my .klm files of all the unruly cactus in the areas you map....

I just got done with a 30 day stay there in AZ ,,

Sorry i missed you Ruby,,, oh yeah you too Clay..... :P

And the answer is Yes,,,I am taking some sample of cacti with me around the usa------ I am hiding them under my skin!!!!!!

paul

love you both!!!

KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK!!!!

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